[ad_1]
- For her second job, Mallory Rowan looked for a low-cost startup that wouldn’t lead to burnout.
- She built a marketing company called Rowan Marketing and initially spent $22 to start it.
- Today, her business regularly puts her in six figures in annual revenue, she told Insider.
When Mallory Rowan was 21 years old, she started her first e-commerce business selling powerlifting apparel.
She left the rigid hours of corporate America to join the startup scene for greater flexibility and greater impact. But she did not realize the damage to her body.
After two years running her company, “I was really starting to burn out,” Rowan told Insider. After months of inexplicable rashes on her face, hair loss and four rounds of pneumonia she couldn’t shake, “That’s when I started being like, ‘OK, I can’t be a mess 24/7.'”
Rowan closed the clothing business and took a break before starting her next venture, Rowan Marketing. Today, her career offers one-on-one coaching and self-directed courses to help other founders build brands without feeling burned out.
Rowan invested $22 in 2019 to launch the startup. As of 2020, her first full year in business, she will earn six figures annually, documents seen by Insider show.
Rowan shares her own steps to start and grow an online business with low startup costs. This is an as-told story based on an interview with Rowan, slightly edited for length and clarity.
Lean into the benefits of online businesses
When I decided to start Rowan Marketing, I knew I wanted to create something sustainable for my mental and physical health. I decided to take my startup marketing skills and offer them to others who wanted to grow.
But while growing up, I knew I wanted to take a break and focus on other areas of my business and life. That’s why I started one-on-one sessions and quickly turned them into online self-directed learning programs.
I paid $12 a year for a web domain and a personal email (as opposed to a Gmail account) to grow from a one-time consultant to a business entity. The initial investment of $22 helped me establish the brand’s professionalism.
The business operates entirely online for accessibility and cost purposes. With an online brand and online audience members, nothing is limited to a specific location.
Being online helps us stay connected to the community by sharing through social media and email. Generating an email list is important for online creators, because it’s the only content we have if other social platforms are shut down.
Additionally, developing an online ecosystem is a great way to engage and engage with peer-to-peer affiliates that allow you and other business owners to introduce and refer customers to each other.
Use free resources to learn
There are many free resources to learn about building a brand.
Business owners share tips on YouTube or TikTok, and consultants like me typically have libraries of free resources on their platforms.
As transparent as it is about how people launch brands, there are tons of educational tools that founders can use at zero cost.
There are also free options for graphic design, email marketing and communication tools. When I started I used free platforms like Canva and Slack and I recommend other founders to do the same.
Most of these platforms also have standard subscriptions, which can be used as a stepping stone, as your business grows.
Keep your business as long as possible.
Rowan suggests making your business as lean as possible at all levels.
Courtesy of Rowan
I advise founders at all stages of development to keep their businesses low-cost. In many cases, it becomes more difficult when you start making profits and you have to decide how to use the money.
Plus, if you can stay lean, you won’t have to lean later if something happens to the business or the economy as a whole.
Even though I’m a founder, I’m not a big risk taker so that’s how I choose to do my work.
It also allows flexibility in business development and privacy, especially for women and expectant parents. I’ve met many clients who don’t want to work out to burn because they’re planning to get pregnant and take care of their bodies differently.
Being able to say, “I’m going to shut down my business for a few months and have no expenses to spend time on” would be very liberating.
[ad_2]
Source link
